


Nocturnal Habits

by Stariceling



Category: Death Note
Genre: Gen, Sleep
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-10-15
Updated: 2007-10-15
Packaged: 2017-12-05 19:13:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,206
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/726939
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Stariceling/pseuds/Stariceling
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Just one of the things you have to deal with while being attatched to someone twenty-four hours a day. L has some odd sleeping habits.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Sleeping

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted these in the opposite order, but I guess it was confusing.
> 
> Having L and Light handcuffed together 24 hours a day had to lead to some issues like this.

It wasn't the fact that Light snored that bothered him. The noises Light made in his sleep weren't even loud enough to wake him up when he’d managed to fall asleep. L was more bothered by the mere feeling of someone close to him in the dark. The occasional subvocal, rattling breath was only the most immediate, unwelcome reminder of Light's presence there in that sleepless dark.

Staring into nothing, trying to think about sleep and not about the still, silent sleeper next to him, was the only time L genuinely disliked being handcuffed to Light. He had been prepared for some inevitable inconveniences working with another person twenty-four hours a day. He had even anticipated the fact that Light kept to a regular schedule, and had mostly adapted to eating and sleeping at specific times. It was only this empty time in the dark that bothered him still.

L simply didn't savor the idea of getting a day’s worth of sleep all in one stretch. Being out in that dreaming void for six to eight hours at a time bothered him. It made him feel out of touch, as if he might have lost days at a time without realizing it. He couldn't get used to that, and so he kept waking in the middle of the night to find Light still soundly asleep.

At least Light wasn't making noises in his sleep now. In fact, he seemed peaceful. His breathing remained deep and even while L shifted restlessly on his pillow.

Still the middle of the night, and nothing to do but sleep or lie sleepless. Even the faintest light from the window gave him nothing to focus on, and seemed to exist only to cast more shadows across Light's face, masking an expression that L might not have been able to decipher anyway. He had watched Light sleep during his solitary confinement just in case, as Light had suggested, he somehow became Kira in his sleep. There had been nothing special about his sleeping expressions then.

L moved with exaggerated care, trying not to wake his sleeping bunkmate as he shifted to his hands and knees. He leaned over Light to watch him breathe. How could he stand to sleep so long all at one time? Not that L was helping to change Light's sleeping habits. He had never gone out of his way to disturb Light even when he couldn't sleep any more.

He couldn't sleep any more, and it was so boring simply watching Light sleep motionlessly. L lay his head against Light's chest to listen to him breathing. He curled in on himself, laying on his drawn-in legs and lowering his upper body to rest more steadily on his forearms.

This close to Light, L found he could hear the other boy’s heartbeat. Warmth seeped up through the thin pajama top and into L's cheek. He was only a little closer than they had been since he made up his mind to keep Light within reach at all times. Just a tiny bit closer. The change was barely enough to be worth noting.

His eyes stayed fixed on the underside of Light's chin. He had realized already that he didn't know what to do with a Light who wasn't Kira. Sooner or later, was he going to have to accept Light’s innocence as a truth that he had somehow overlooked?

L closed his eyes for one long minute. When he opened them again there was still nothing to see but vague darkness and Light's body blocked out in deeper shadow. His cheek had grown accustomed to the warmth seeping up from Light's body until he could no longer feel it. There was only that single sound to focus on.

L closed his eyes again.

There was nothing but the sound of Light's heartbeat, steady beneath his ear. He would move his head in a minute, or two, or perhaps once that sound was done trying to lull him to sleep. L hadn't meant to sleep any more that night, but somehow he forgot all about that, and drifted to sleep with his head pillowed against Light's chest.


	2. Waking

Light dreamed he was drowning. The warm weight of the water pressed into his chest, trapping him under the glitter of sun through sea-foam. Fish nibbled at his bare fingers and toes as he stared upward, watching the waves pass above him. Breathing slowly, waiting with the expectation that he would begin to drown any moment now.

Plainly he was trapped underwater, he could feel the pressure from it bearing down on him. It only made sense to expect this half-conscious attempt to breathe water to end badly. Yet the water only pressed down on his chest as he continued to breathe, instead of rushing into his lungs to burn and drown and wake him.

The colors of his dream bled to dark wisps as Light became lucidly aware that it was a dream. At the same time he realized that a real weight was pressing down on his body. It might not be suffocating him, but whatever it was made it impossible to move.

When he opened his eyes there was a faded-gray shadow curled on his chest in the dim light, breathing warm, slow breaths on the exposed skin above his collar. He could make out messy black hair and a sliver of face with one closed eye turned toward him. He must still be dreaming. Even with their enforced proximity, why would L ever climb on top of him to sleep?

Too surreal to be real, but too heavy to be a dream. Light stared down at the relaxed body on top of his, trying to piece together a logical reason that would compel L to climb on top of him at any time. Did he actually mistrust Light so much that he thought he might do something even in his sleep? Was that why he had insisted they be handcuffed together?

L was clinging to him, fingers clenched in Light's pajama top to keep himself from slipping off. Slight, experimental shifts on Light’s part did nothing to dislodge him. Why would he want to perch on Light’s chest during the night? It could be that L was taking the idea of monitoring him too seriously. But he had dismissed the idea of Light becoming ‘Kira’ in his sleep before, and if he was still that suspicious he shouldn’t have fallen asleep on top of his suspect. Not that L ever seemed to sleep deeply, or long.

Light's thoughts were interrupted when the eye he could see cracked open. L's fingers relaxed their grip on his shirt as his body uncurled enough for him to lift his head and look at Light with both eyes. If he was at all aware of how inappropriate his current position was, it didn’t show.

“You snore.”

That alone made Light's patience snap. He braced both hands on L's shoulders and bodily shoved the other boy off of his chest. "You're heavy!" He would have liked to add a lot of things, like weird and creepy and having no concept of personal space, but somehow. . . it was still too early for anything beyond 'heavy.'


End file.
